


And I'm Going Under (Deliver Me)

by GideonGraystairs



Series: Tumblr Fics [14]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alec Lightwood Saves Magnus Bane, Alec saves the day, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Pirate, First Meetings, M/M, Merman Alec, Pirate Magnus Bane, sounds weirder than it is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 19:47:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10974135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GideonGraystairs/pseuds/GideonGraystairs
Summary: He nearly passes out all over again because there’s aboyin it. An actual human being just treading nonchalantly back and forth in swaying motions. There’s something moving in the water below him, too. Something glowing charcoal and silver and navy blue andholy shit is that a fucking tail?





	And I'm Going Under (Deliver Me)

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on [Tumblr](http://raphaelsantiago.co.vu) 07/20/2015.
> 
> Requested by Anonymous as a songfic prompt: never let me go by florence and machine
> 
> Yes, that's right. I'm still working on cross-posting everything. That's how much there is.

* * *

 

_Looking up from underneath_  
_Fractured moonlight on the sea_  
_Reflections still look the same to me_  
_As before I went under_

 

* * *

 

“All hands on deck!” someone screams, just as the bow crumbles into the ocean with a groan. “Steady her out!”

Magnus sucks in a deep breath full of seawater and tries to find footing on the soaked slabs of wood, making his way slowly towards the wheel. Ragnor’s behind it, using his entire body-weight to keep it from turning as much as possible, and Magnus can see the struggle on his pale face where it digs into his sides. If they make it out of this, he’s going to have some nasty cuts.

The ship tilts suddenly, careening sideways as the water crashes across the crumbling deck and Ragnor goes flying toward the edge. Magnus lets out a shout, clinging to the railing as hard as he can even as it slips through his grip. Salt water catches the wind and flies into his face, burning everywhere it touches, and the raging ocean drowns out the sounds of men screaming as the main mast snaps the deck in half. He lets out another cry that gets him nothing but water down his throat as he’s finally flung indefinitely towards the dark water.

He’s drowning, black liquid filling every part of him as he struggles to reach the surface, failing every time he moves his arms. He wants to cry out, though he knows it would get him nothing but another lungful of slow death, wants kick and fight and maybe cling to one of the pieces of driftwood floating upwards, but he’s so so tired already and the water’s kind of beautiful, even though he knows it’s going to kill him. 

He’s looking up, where he can still see the surface and the ship and the pieces of both men and broken wood crumbling into the ocean. He almost looks for Ragnor, though he knows there’s not a chance of him finding him in the slowly darkening water as he sinks deeper and deeper towards his death.

It hurts, it does― the pressure is crushing his lungs and his head and the muscles in his arms ache so much he can’t move them even an inch ―but there’s a kind of calm serenity in going like this, he thinks. Like it’s how it was meant to be: born at sea, died at sea.

He wonders if his mother would have missed him, had she been alive. He wonders if he’ll see her or if he’ll just stop existing and that’ll be the end of it.

Except he doesn’t have much time to ponder the thought because he’s already blacking out, choking for breath he’ll never get this far down, and the pressure is so great he can’t form a single thought anymore. And just as everything finally slips off to black, he swears he feels something wrapped around his waist, pulling him somewhere where it doesn’t hurt so much.

 

* * *

 

_And it’s over_  
_And I’m going under_  
_But I’m not giving up_  
_I’m just giving in_

 

* * *

 

The next time he opens his eyes, Magnus is most definitely not drowning beneath a sinking ship. He’s in what seems to be a cave of some sort, only there’s no entrance in sight but the pool of pitch black water four feet below the rocky ground he’s laid on. He chokes, coughing into his hand and expecting spews of seawater but getting nothing but salty air instead. Frowning now, he pushes himself upright and leans forward to glance at the water below.

And then nearly passes out all over again because there’s a _boy_ in it. An actual human being just treading nonchalantly back and forth in swaying motions. There’s something moving in the water below him, too. Something glowing charcoal and silver and navy blue and _holy shit is that a fucking tail?_

He makes a sort of dying whale sound, tripping over onto his ass just as the freaking _merman_ looks up. Gasping for breath, he twists his fingers into his shirt, right over his racing heart, and tells himself to calm the fuck down because he must have been seeing things. Near-death experiences can do that to people, or so he’s heard.

Except that when he finally does manage a semi-normal breathing pattern and leans over to peek back at the boy now staring up at him with interest, the bottom half of its torso still slips off into a tail.

“Oh my God,” he exclaims, sounding every bit as intelligent as he feels. “Oh my _God_.”

The boy/thing/merman cocks his head sideways in a curious manner, but doesn’t say anything. Magnus isn’t entirely sure he even knows English, but he’s too busy staring at him in disbelief to consider the thought for long.

Because he has a freaking tail and almost transparent spatterings of what could pass as make-up at random parts of his body in the shape of scales, but also he’s really impossibly beautiful and Magnus hopes the Little Mermaid is right and not the tales of sailors being dragged to their deaths. He might be getting a little bit lost in those burning blue eyes and the long expanses of pale skin on full display. So, sue him― he’s been at sea a seriously long time with a bunch of stuck-up straight guys.

“Is this real?” he finds himself mumbling, unable to tear his eyes away from the creature barely a meter below him. He is not at all expecting for its mouth to twist into a mildly amused smirk, nor for said mouth to open and have actual words come out.

“I hope so,” says the fish-thing. Magnus nearly falls over into the water from shock.

“So you do speak English,” he manages after he recovers from his billionth heart attack in the last five minutes.

The boy tilts his head again, the same curious gesture as before. “Is that what you call this?” he asks, sounding so honestly perplexed Magnus can’t help but find it ridiculously adorable. Which, no, not okay. This boy is part fish, for God’s sake.

He sucks in a shallow breath that does nothing to calm the twisting in his stomach. “What…” he starts, but realizes there are so many questions hovering around him that he has absolutely no idea where to start. Apparently, though, the boy/fish/creature seems to gather what he’s trying to sort out.

“You were drowning,” he says. “I saved you.”

Yeah, okay. That answers _everything_. “But why…”

“You’re cute,” the boy informs him dutifully, like that explains without a doubt why he just decided to help him. “And you scream really loud.”

And what? He _screams really loud?_ What on earth is that supposed to mean? It’s not like he could even scream when he was in the water and he knows for a fact that he didn’t so much as try. So either the kid is crazy (which wouldn’t be surprising considering, you know, the _tail_ ) or Magnus is missing some pretty important memories.

The boy seems to sense his confusion (Magnus is beginning to think mermaids have a sixth sense for practically reading people’s minds) because he lets out a soft sigh and sinks a little deeper into the water, until it’s swaying just under his chin. “I heard you,” he explains, lifting a pale arm to tap at his temple. “In here.”

Magnus tries to get his breathing back under control again, he does, but it’s a little hard when the kid’s just told him he’s basically psychic. A sixth sense is one thing, but actual mind-reading? He’s having a little trouble processing that information. “So you can read my mind,” he replies in echo of his thoughts, his voice embarrassingly high-pitched before he clears his throat. “Is that a mermaid thing or are you just creepy?”

The boy giggles briefly before his expression morphs into something unreadable. There’s something in his eyes, the way he’s looking at Magnus, that says things he thinks he should know, should feel, and he knows he’s leaving everything out when he says, “It happens on occasion.” And he doesn’t call him out on the lie, despite how clearly it flashes through the spaces between them. Instead, he takes a deep breath and shifts until he’s siting with his feet hanging just above the water and leans forward to better see the creature below.

“Do you have a name?” he asks, deciding that’s a safe place to start. The boy looks amused at the question, swishing his tail below him to push him back a foot or two.

“Do you?” he counters, eyes glinting with mischief and giggles. It’s odd, how much younger he seems even though Magnus is certain they’re around the same age. There are also moments, however, where he seems so much older, like he so much wiser than Magnus could ever hope to be. It’s disconcerting and intriguing all at once.

“Magnus,” he replies easily, leaning down to run his hand through the water. He watches the ripples as he does, imagining them a thousand times bigger like the ones that had sunk _The Lady Midnight_.

He only looks back up when he hears a soft voice, so unlike the tone he’s been hearing for the past fifteen minutes, mutter a gentle, “Alec.” He thinks it’s sort of beautiful, like the boy to whom it belongs.

He doesn’t have a chance to tell him that, though, because barely a moment later Alec’s eyes are going wide with alarm. “I have to go,” he says quickly, not giving Magnus a chance to reply before he’s suddenly diving down, his tail flipping up behind him, and then he’s gone, just like that.

“Wait!” Magnus calls, but it’s too late. He’s alone in a cave with no way out, abandoned by the beautiful and impossible boy who saved him from drowning.

What even is his life?

 

* * *

 

_And the arms of the ocean are carrying me_  
_And all this devotion was rushing out of me_  
_And the crashes are heaven for a sinner like me_  
_But the arms of the ocean delivered me_

 

* * *

 


End file.
